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Originally Posted by irishworld
Where in China do you go? What do you do there?
Just interested- my take is VASTLY different after living and working for a year and a half there for the American Chamber of Commerce....and a few months there on and off since...and two years as a China analyst out of country....
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I spend the majority of my time just outside Ningbo (South of Shanghai) doing a factory startup (equipment installation and personnel training) with a couple trips to Zhuhai, several Shanghai, and Hangzhou (BEAUTIFUL place). My take is a bit more from the industrial side as it is tremendously difficult to get anything done. When you ask and get the answer of tomorrow, all that means is not today. High grade, high pressure concrete is simply not available. It's quite different from America in that American functions based on rules. You apply for a permit, based on the qualifications and procedures/conformance, you get the permit. You ship equipment over, and based on ships, trucking company availability, municipal inspections, etc. you get your equipment. In China, absolutely NOTHING happens unless you know the right people. We waited 3 weeks for equipment to be delivered "tomorrow". Finally we enlisted the aid of our consultants, bam, the local offical called and our equipment was delivered 1 hour later. It's a different environment which is acceptable, but I honestly believe it's a tremendous dis-advantage. The complete lack of IP protection or reprocussions are another point of contention there. I believe business is there for manufacturing only for cost reasons, no other. Should that cost advantage begin to wane or be offset by the infrastructure failures, so will the interest in China.